Starring: Chadwick Boseman, Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong’o, Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Daniel Kaluuya, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke, Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker and Andy Serkis

Directed by Ryan Coogler

Marvel, out now (UK), February 16 (USA)

Secrets have a way of being found out – no matter who you are.

By some distance, the most vibrant of the Marvel movies – both visually and aurally – Black Panther is also one of the best, and shows that the studio can continue to throw up new and appropriate ways of tackling their heroes. There’s hard-hitting action and humour as you’d expect alongside a rather different tone, including a spiritual element that feels organic.

Right from the opening sequence, nothing is quite what it seems, and the revelations are parsed out sparingly so that each hits at the appropriate moment. Characters who seemed unassailable – physically or morally – aren’t; choices are made for reasons that aren’t as clearcut as they might first seem. Chadwick Boseman plays T’Challa as almost more of an anti-hero than a hero at times, and it gives the character an edge that some of his superhero colleagues can lack – you can certainly see him making a guest starring appearance in one of the Netflix shows, which isn’t something you could say about Stephen Strange or Peter Parker that easily. Boseman handles the physicality of the role well: the fights are downright vicious at times but director Coogler ensures that, even in the 3D version, you’re following things easily. (The 3D is used more for depth of field than throwing things at the screen – although of course there’s the odd moment where that has to happen!) The only element that sometimes is unclear is the geography of Wakanda itself, but that’s never a major problem.

The casting across the board is one of the movie’s real strengths – Michael B. Jordan’s Erik and Letitia Wright’s Shuri stand out even so (Wright revelling in Shuri’s role as the Black Panther’s Q). It sometimes seems as if Andy Serkis’ Klaue has wandered in from a different film but that only goes to emphasise how grounded some elements of this feel. Lupita Nyong’o and Danai Gurira represent two very different female forces within Wakandan society while Forest Whitaker adds gravitas as Zuri in the exact way he didn’t (thanks, one suspects, to re-edits and reshoots) in Rogue One! The music – both the songs and the score – feel very much part of the worldbuilding that Coogler carries out in the film, with some great use of strings in the orchestral moments.

Coogler and Joe Robert Cole’s script has to conform to certain norms of the Marvel Cinematic Universe but the world-shaking threat is something very different from that seen previously – and the “villain’s” plan is equally something that makes a large degree of sense. (We’re entering spoiler territory to discuss it further; suffice it to say, there are no easy answers in this one.) And before people ask, yes there’s a Stan Lee cameo (as ever fun but inessential) and two sequences after the titles start, one mid-credits, which is a good capstone to the movie we’ve just watched, and a post-credits one that looks ahead to the next release…

Verdict: A vibrant and highly enjoyable addition to the MCU – recommended. 9/10

Paul Simpson